Worlds Apart
by X Music Is Believing X
Summary: He was always there...always.


**A/N: This is pure speculation on my part about how the story could turn out, based on something I read somewhere online. Numbers are her age.**

**1 hour…**

She is utterly unaware of the world. Sleeping soundly while those around her cry and snuffle. Proud parents are watching the other occupants of the room she is currently in, but, little does she know, there is only one person watching her. He is watching her like he cannot believe his eyes, and maybe he can't.

He loosens his bowtie a little while letting out a noise that could either be a cough or a laugh as his surveys the name tag on her crib. Were her parents that stupid, to believe time could be re-written by a name?

It cannot. He should know.

* * *

><p><strong>5...<strong>

From a very young age, she has known she was an extremely overprotected child. Despite the fact the live in a small village where nothing has ever, (or, in her opinion ever will) happens, she is still never even allowed as far as the post office or the duck pond. she's walked to school every morning and walked back every night, which sees her excessively teased by the other children and generally branded 'weird' and left to sit alone in the corner of the playground every day. She doesn't mind, it gives her time to do what she loves best; lie back and stare up at the sky and dream about flying among the stars. She's had that dream for a long as she can remember, but her parents don't understand it. They never do.

* * *

><p><strong>6...<strong>

She doesn't want to cry. She's endured their torments for years now and it has never bothered her; that is, until today. 'Freak' is a word that hurts when its directed at you, especially when 40 children are chanting it until your run off, finding a safe place to hide.

"Are you okay?"

She looks up. There is a man standing not far away, leaning against a tree and looking at her with concern in his voice. He has on a strange jacket and a bowtie, which she likes. Bowties are good.

"I'm not supposed to talk to strangers." she tells him, remembering her mother's words

He smiles slightly, and moves to hand her a handkerchief.

"What's your name?" he asks her.

She knows she should be running away, yet she feels strongly comforted by this peculiar man who she has never seen before.

"Alison Amelia Williams-Pond" she says, and cannot keep the hint of sulkiness out of her voice.

"You don't like that name?"

"I hate it."

"Maybe you should come up with a new one."

"Like what?" she asks, but when she glances over again, he is gone.

* * *

><p><strong>7...<strong>

The next time she sees him, its Christmas eve. Her parents have gone out to a party and left her in the care of her grandmother, who is, of course, asleep. She comes downstairs to get a drink of water in the night and finds him at the kitchen table, dipping fish finger in custard, as if it is a perfectly commonplace thing to do.

"Hello Alison Amelia Williams-Pond" he says.

"Hello."

He stretches out his hand, "We haven't been formally introduced, I'm The Doctor."

She shakes it. "Like Dr Dawson?"

"Who's Dr Dawson?"

"The man who comes here when somebody's sick."

"Then no, I'm not that kind of doctor."

"Then what kind of doctor are you?"

"I.." he begins, building it up for effect, "am a time traveller."

She feels her eyes widen.

"A time traveller?" she asks.

He nods. "Anywhere in time or space."

She hears a door bang upstairs, her parents returning home. When she looks back, he has vanished again. All that remains is a candy cane with her name attached to the label.

* * *

><p><strong>9...<strong>

She feels that she is being shouted at more and more nowadays. It seems that anytime she mentions her dreams about space, or her friend (especially her friend) she gets shouted at. She discovered the tree at the bottom of the garden was a good place to hide when she was much younger, and often comes here.

"Well, good evening, Alison Amelia."

She doesn't have to turn around to know who it is. It seems that anytime she is upset, he is there, as if somehow, he knows.

"My parents hate me." she tells him.

"No they don't." A pause. "They love you, its me they hate."

"You know my parents?"

"I did, a long time ago."

"Why do they hate you?"

He shakes his head. "Its a long story. Basically, they think I'm going to hurt you one day, when your grown up."

"You would never hurt me." she tells him with confidence. He smiles at her sadly, then adds.

"One day, a long time from now, I'll get you killed. So don't trust me. You shouldn't."

* * *

><p><strong>15...<strong>

She doesn't know where she's going when she leaves the party. All she knows is that she cant see for tears and she's angry, more with herself than anything because she never _ever_ cries. especially not over a boy. She also knows this is a stupid idea. Running in the rain with no shoes on when its dark and your angry is never a good idea.

"Alison?"

She whirls round, and cannot believe her eyes. Standing before her is him. The Doctor. The man she presumed for so long was her childhood imaginary friend. A man whose name she is forbidden to mention in her family home. Without thinking about it, she rushed over a throws her arms around him.

"You Okay?" He asks her, already knowing the answer.

She nods, pulling back to look at him.

"I am now, I Just..." she trails off, scrutinising him. "How to you manage to always find me whenever I'm upset?"

He shrugs. "Maybe someday you tell me how to find you."

She tilts her head to the side, but does not speak.

"So, why were you crying?"

"I wasn't..." she begins, but knows it is useless. "Alex Morton." she finishes.

"Your boyfriend?" he asks.

"EX Boyfriend." She stresses. "Who is now making out with my best friend."

"Hmmm" he replies and turns his head toward the garden party. He raises some kind of device, which makes a buzzing noise and lights up blue. suddenly, she quite clearly sees the cauldron, filled with some kind of green gundge put out as a decoration, levitate slightly before tipping and dropping the gunge all over the offending couple.

She cannot hold back a giggle, but when she turns back to him, his smile is somewhat weak.

"Don't let them keep you down. Someday, your going to be...amazing." He tells her. She doesn't question him. He's the time traveller after all.

* * *

><p><strong>18...<strong>

It feels like her heart is breaking. After all their disagreements, they were still her parents, and she loved them all the same. She knew from the second the policeman rang the door her life was going to change, and never be the same again.

She remembers him sitting down, trying to tell her that it was all very complex and he would try to explain. He never got to. A man in a black trench coat had at that moment swept in unannounced, and on the simple order of the word 'Torchwood' the policeman had left. The man in the trench coat had told her some story about _'a car accident, nothing they could do, very sorry for your loss.'_

She hadn't bought it for a second.

Her grandmother had insisted on arranging the funeral. She was much too young to deal with such things, she had been told. So now, as her grandmother handed out scones and everyone inside talked about what a great loss it was, she escapes to her childhood tree. Her safe place. She doesn't even need to wonder if he will be there. She knows he will.

He wasn't up the tree this time, instead, standing at the bottom of it, leaning against the outside of what she recognises to be a 1960's police box.

"Still want to see the stars?" He asks her.

It briefly registers that she isn't sure she ever told him that dream, but whose to argue with the man who knows everything?

From the second she steps inside the blue box (Bigger on the inside, how is that possible?) she suddenly feels a strong sense of peace and belonging. It as if, at long last, she's come _home._

* * *

><p><strong>…And Forever<strong>

"So what, exactly am I looking at?"

He signs impatiently. She has come to interpret that as his 'humans are stupid' sigh.

"The medusa cascade, one of the most beautiful phenomenon in the entire universe."

She smiles, and he continues.

"See, ledged has it that my name is written in the stars here."

She squints at the view. "What? Somewhere out there, the stars spell 'doctor'?"

He rolls his eyes. "Not that name. The real one. _My _real one."

She is surprised, she supposes she never thought of him as anything other than 'The Doctor'.

"What is it? The real one?"

He raises his eyebrows. "That," he says "Is a story for another time."

It is her turn to roll her eyes. Will he ever give up being mysterious?

"What about my name, then?" she asks him "Is it out there too?"

"Your name? You Think 'Alison Amelia Williams-Pond' is written out there in the stars?" He teases.

"No," she replies. "The other one, the one you told me to choose for myself."

"Well, did you?" He asks.

"Did I What?"

"Choose a name for yourself?"

"No, I was hoping you would... do it for me." Annoyingly, she knows she is blushing.

He smiles slightly and looks back out at the stars. "Wait...now you mention it, there is a name out there for you." He tells her, a teasing note to his voice still.

"Where?" She asks. "I cant see it."

"Of course you cant. You cant read Gallifreyian." She could swears she hears him add '_yet'_.

"Well, what does is say?"

He turns to look at her, and for one moment, his eyes are unguarded, and the range of emotions she sees there are blinding.

Just like the second time they met, he extends his hand to her.

"Pleasure to meet you, River Song."


End file.
